


Life is Short, but Death is Super Long

by Hihoneyimdead



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Ambiguous/Open Ending, Angst, Canonical Character Death, Dead People, End!Tim, Fix-It of Sorts, Implied/Referenced Suicide, M/M, Not Beta Read, Swearing, We Die Like Men, aka me saying tim totally isn't dead guys, post 160, the relationship is background tbh
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-13
Updated: 2019-12-13
Packaged: 2021-02-26 00:29:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,572
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21774472
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hihoneyimdead/pseuds/Hihoneyimdead
Summary: The rules:Each player rolls a dice. The number rolled is how many lives you have. Each player then rolls two dice. Whoever rolls the lowest loses a life. The last person standing wins.Tim always wins.
Relationships: Martin Blackwood/Jonathan Sims, Relationship - Relationship
Comments: 6
Kudos: 121





	Life is Short, but Death is Super Long

**Author's Note:**

> this is just me coping with finals don't mind me

“Go fish.”

Tim blinks. Once, twice, shakes his head, tries to peek at the Archivist’s cards, only sort of doesn’t flinch as Martin smacks his shoulder. The Archivist, predictably, doesn’t budge an inch, just stares blankly ahead. Probably. Not like Tim can tell with the blindfold and all. 

Across from him on the other side of a rotting, broken-down, bloody picnic table is a  _ thing _ with a baby-blue dishrag covering its eyes. Its yellow rain jacket is double its size and covered in something vaguely green and vaguely red and vaguely brown. It’s Martin’s, definitely Martin’s, and God if Tim doesn’t wish the betting pool stayed up after Sasha’s...departure. The Archivist looks good. It’s unfortunate. 

Martin won’t sit down. He has a knife. He shouldn’t have a knife. Last time Tim saw Martin with a knife, well. 

Martin shouldn’t have a knife. 

But he does, and it’s probably better than the spooky eye monster having one, but that doesn’t mean it’s a great idea. Martin looks scared. And scared people do stupid things. Like stab people named Tim Stoker through the hand the moment someone named Tim Stoker tried reaching for the cards in his bag. And then he  _ apologized _ , and the Archivist just sat there, and Tim just sat there, and Elias must be shitting himself laughing wherever he is. 

The cards are on the table. The chips are on the table. And the dice are in Tim’s jacket pocket in a little blue bag with a silver drawstring and a little eye in silver thread on the side. 

“We’re playing poker,” Tim says, slowly, because maybe the Archivist lost it a bit during the end of the world (Tim heart it started it, even, and ain’t that the kicker.)

“You’re the one who invited me,” smirks the Archivist. Triumphant. Fucking stupid.

Tim blinks again. Tries to get another peek at the cards, is smacked again, winks up at Martin, whose cheeks go just a tad towards the color of a wilting rose. He’s still cute, even under all the blood. 

“Doesn’t mean you get to change the game halfway through,” Tim says. He taps at the table with a finger, not really feeling the pull as the knife twists in with the movement. Martin makes a small noise, almost like a dying puppy, and pulls his jacket tighter around himself, crossing his arms. Tim glances up at him, just barely. “What, you actually that bad at poker?”

“He can’t lie to save his life,” Martin says, almost sounding fond. Disgusting. 

“No, really?” Tim gapes, putting the hand holding his cards to his cheek and making an honest attempt at looking astonished. Like he didn’t know for months before the big reveal that Jonathan Sims was dead. Because, really, the Archivist is a shittier liar than Jon ever was. “Couldn’t have guessed.”

Tim forces down a shudder as he feels the Archivist roll its eyes. Through the acidic clouds above, he can almost see the Eye doing the same. It’s blue today. Neat. 

“Glad to see you haven’t changed, then,” the Archivist says, almost sounding fond. Disgusting. It doesn’t bother hiding the sliver of a smile peeking out through all the grime on its face. 

“Not like I could’ve,” Tim says. “Being dead and all. Puts a real damper on self-development, you know.”

The Archivist flinches at that, surprisingly (Tim didn’t think it felt anything, anymore, after hearing about the Lukas from the boss a few months back), and Martin shoots Tim a glare he’d probably be able to feel in his soul if it wasn’t in a billion pieces under the remains of a wax museum in Yarmouth. He puts his hand on the Archivist’s shoulder, ignoring the blood completely. The Archivist puts a burned, worm-scarred hand on top of it. Tim gags. Martin glares. The Archivist sighs. 

“I really am sorry about that,” the Archivist says, almost sounding entirely apologetic. Tim would believe it if it were, hmm, not a fucking liar (but the Archivist can’t lie to save its life, neither could Jon, but it also is evil and shit, soooo…). It sounds tired. Tough shit. 

“Right, whatever,” Tim snaps. His knifed hand twitches. The bag in his pocket sits heavy. He takes a breath in and lets it out through his nose. He smacks a fake smile on his face. “Sorry about that. Lost it a bit there. You up for another round?”

Martin narrows his eyes. Tim flutters his eyelashes innocently up at him. Martin narrows his eyes even further. Tim smiles sweetly, though this is...weird. Weird. Tim’d heard that Martin kinda was dead for a bit, had to, in his line of work, but maybe he didn’t come back. Maybe. Maybe whatever the Archivist thinks it has is the shell of someone who used to be something more. Tim heard the Lukases got to him. Tim heard the Archivist took a Lukas out. Tim heard many things, none of them good. Honestly, monsters deserve monsters, even if they share the faces of the dead (God knows Tim knows about that one by now.)

The Archivist huffs and palpably rolls its eyes again, dropping its hand and leaning forward, crossing its hands like a nice little altar boy on the table. Elbows on. Horrid manners, really. 

“Really, Tim, I think we should get on with the show here. You obviously have something else in mind, and Martin and I have to be out of the area by the next rainstorm in twenty minutes. He isn’t acid-proof.”

Tim shivers. The knife twists even more, and he’d almost forgotten what the feeling of being Watched was like. A year dead dulls the senses, after all. Especially a year of Death. It tickles, almost, sends a shock down his shattered spine and down into what remains of the lower half of his body. He can feel the bones smushing up against each other down there, not like Martin or the Archivist would be able to tell. He’s very good at not looking like a pile of Tim Stoker-shaped bacon bits, thank you very much (and he’s had practice.) The Archivist, for once, doesn’t back away or apologize. 

Two years dead. 

Tim sighs again (umpteenth time since the two lovebirds caught sight of him outside the Tesco half an hour ago) and puts the cards down. The Archivist copies him. Its cards are laid out face-up. All aces, somehow,  _ Jee-zus _ . 

Tim moves to pull the knife out of his hand, but he stops once one hand is curled around the handle. He looks up at Martin, eyebrow raised. “May I?”

Martin just stares. Tim’s pretty sure he hasn’t blinked once, yet, and is he looking more and more transparent? Interesting. Must be Forsaken’s turn to play, explains why Filth’s fucked off for the bit. 

So Tim takes that as an affirmative and pulls the knife out, wiggles his fingers as his skin begins to knit back together. His knuckles pop; the Archivist makes the weird half-choking noise Jon always made when he heard literally anything resembling bones popping, and Tim’s heart almost breaks for a fallen comrade yet again. But, like, he doesn’t have time for that. He has to finish this up and get home in time. He grins and wiggles his eyebrows at Martin as he absently chucks the knife in that general direction. Martin fumbles with it for a moment before managing to keep it from dropping through his hands and nodding jerkily. 

The way he’s looking at Tim, like he’s looking at Jon when he didn’t leave his office for two days straight, like he’s blocking the way into the Archivist’s office every time that cop woman came by while the Archivist was recording. God, the way. His chin jutted out just so, his eyebrows furrowed, knife clenched in his hand like he’s going to stab Tim again fully knowing it won’t do jack shit. Nothing can kill him anymore except Death himself. Or, well, Martin probably doesn’t know that. He was kind of an idiot back in the day, real oblivious to everything except his own issues (cough-Jon-cough.) The Archivist probably does, though. Bastard. 

“Your boyfriend’s going a bit foggy, Archivist,” Tim nonchalantly says, fishing the bag out of his pocket and dumping the dice on the table. He pretends not to watch the Archivist immediately turn and take Martin’s hand in its, pretends not to hear a word of the disgusting things it says (“Keep your eyes on me,” it says, not that Tim hears it. “Ignore everything else.”)

He picks a die up and rolls it between his thumb and index finger, humming a bit. He knows the process by now. Pull out the dice after a successful card game, offer a wager. Usually joking. If they win, he gets their soul. And they laugh and say the bet’s on, they get a tenner if they win. He wins, they go on, he drinks the rest of their beer and doesn’t pay and goes to get wasted at the nearest dive bar. He was in America, mostly. Didn’t want to come back to England for obvious reasons, but there’s no way he could pass this up. 

There are four dice. God knows who they’re made out of, probably some old bastard with legs like jelly. Last Tim heard, they’re femur bone. But he’ll say they’re made of skull because that’s way cooler. Martin looks down at the dice, already looking more present, then up at Tim, frowning. It doesn’t suit him. Reminds Tim too much of the Lukases based entirely off the one time he went to go collect one of them for the boss. Peter, maybe. One of the more bastardly ones. Frowns were always Jon’s thing, like he had cornered the market on them. No, he did corner the market on them. Even Tim, towards the end, just stared down at his magazines and art books and suicide notes with a face matching the ones they were on their way to blow to smithereens. 

The Archivist tilts its head back to look at Martin and smiles, actually  _ smiles _ . It has his fucking smile. It is going to die. Tim Knows it. Today, or tomorrow, or at someone else’s hands. Preferably Melanie’s. Or Basira’s. They deserve a chance at strangling at least one of their captors. 

“Mexico, right?” the Archivist asks, sounding so fucking fond it hits right where the ashy remnants of Tim’s heart sit in the pit of his chest cavity. “Don’t need to explain the rules.”

_ “I Know the rules,”  _ the Archivist doesn’t say, but Tim can practically hear it. Because he and Jon and Sash- Not-Sasha (not Martin, he wasn’t invited no matter how much Not-Sasha begged, how much actual Sasha probably begged because she was probably a ridiculously nice person before the Archivist fucked it all up) used to play when days were slow and Jon was exhausted from trying to record statements that wouldn’t record and Tim and Not-Sasha were done for the day. And the Archivist knows everything Jonathan Sims used to know. Knows with a capital. 

Tim tosses the die in his hand across the table; the Archivist catches it expertly. Bastard. Martin nervously glances between the two of them. 

“Wager?” the Archivist asks, as if it doesn’t already Know. 

Tim pretends to think about it, tapping his chin with a slight frown. Totally isn’t padding for time because maybe it hurts, a bit, thinking about hurting Martin like this (not hurting Jon, because that isn’t Jon, because Jon’s been dead since 2015, he’s sure of it.)

“Your soul,” Tim settles on, trying to look like he’s real torn up about it. Like he hasn’t been planning this since he woke up on the beach looking whole and with a bag full of dice in his pocket that he didn’t recognize. “If you’ve still got one, that is. If not, I’ll take Martin’s. Don’t really care which.”

Martin’s eyes shoot wide. “Now hold on a minute here, Tim, you can’t just-”

“Hmm, no, I can, kinda what Death does,” Tim hums. He smiles, maybe just a bit saltily. “You’re both marked. I can see it. It’s better I get you than anyone else. Not like you’d want Elias cracking you over the head with a lead pipe, yeah?”

“Well. Yes, actually!” Martin’s face slowly begins turning the color of the stain on his knife. “You’re our friend, Tim!”

“Am I?” Tim leans forward, cocks his head just so. He’s maybe been planning this speech for a year. Or something like it, anyway. “Tell me, Martin, who is that thing right there next to you wearing our dead boss’ skin? How’s it any different than the Circus?”

Martin adjusts his grip on the knife. The Archivist is silent. 

Tim doesn’t even blink as the Eye above focuses in on them. That’ll be Elias, then. 

“How’s it feel to be dating monster?” Tim asks, innocent as the day he died. “Remember Jon?”

“No,” the Archivist quietly says. “I don’t. Could we get on with the game, please?”

“Jon, no-”

Tim snatches up a die and closes his hand around it, shakes it with a wild, probably manic, grin. He was always shit at this game when alive. But Jon was always worse. 

“Right,” Tim interrupts. “I win, you keel over. You win, well. You won’t win.”

The Archivist lets out a small breath and curls his hand around his die. “A statement.”

Tim pauses, because  _ shit _ . “What?”

“I win, you give me your statement. About all…” it waves the hand its sharing with Martin in a neat circle around where Tim’s head would be if it were anywhere close to the Archivist’s eye level. “this. Deal?”

Tim snorts bitterly. “Right, deal.”

And he rolls. And the Archivist rolls. 

Four. And a two. 

Tim can feel his smile brighten. Bingo. 

“You want to go first?” Tim asks. Jon always went first just so he could hurry up and die already so he could get back to whatever book he was working through. Ah, the irony. Tim would laugh if he knew it wouldn’t turn into sobs. Again. 

The Archivist wordlessly reaches for the two dice and rolls. A five, great. Easy to beat. 

Unless Tim rolls a fucking  _ three _ . Which he does. Which is fine, great. Great. 

“Tim?” Martin asks as the Archivist gets to rolling again. He sounds tired, still. Voice thick. Poor kid (only he’s older than Tim by four years, well, five now.) “I, uh. To answer your questions. This is Jon. I know you won’t believe me because you’re a stubborn bastard, but. But it’s him. I know it’s him, even if he doesn’t.”

The Archivist rolls. Two. 

Tim sneers and gathers the dice. “Yeah? Why would Jon do all of this then?”

He looks up at the sky, which looks back at him, and he rolls. The Archivist sucks in a sharp breath, and Tim looks down to see another three. 

“What, the apocalypse?” Martin asks. He’s pale, paler than he was a moment ago, but still present. Though maybe Tim wishes he’d just fade away already, because it’s  _ hard _ seeing his face after all this time. Even if he did stab him a couple minutes ago. “Oh, yeah, Jonah Magnus possessed him and made him read a statement that ended the world.”

Tim blinks.  _ “What?” _

Jonah Magnus is dead. He’s, what, two hundred years old? Three hundred? 

The Archivist takes the dice, rolls an eleven, smirks ever-so-slightly. Last time Tim saw that face, it was on a forced karaoke night. Not-Sasha made a bet that Jon wouldn’t go up and positively slay “Can’t Get You Out of My Head”. And then Jon did, and then Martin gushed to Tim all night about how perfect and beautiful and amazing Jon’s singing voice is and how he should sing more often, shouldn’t he? Shouldn’t he? 

Jon never was one for smiling, but that wasn’t his fault. He just wasn’t one of those people. Tim’s mum wasn’t a big smiler, either. He expressed things differently. He might’ve been a bastard, but he always made sure to drop a cookie he accidentally picked up at lunch off at Tim’s desk on a long day (until after the worms when he was dead and the Archivist decided to stalk him.) The Archivist never smiles except after a full meal of trauma and when looking at Martin Blackwood, apparently. And apparently after rolling really well in Mexico. 

“Oh! Good show, Jon!” Martin chirps. The Archivist  _ blushes _ , actually fucking  _ blushes _ , and Tim almost pukes up his crisps and some of his trachea. Martin winces slightly as Tim picks up the dice with a low growl. “Uh, I mean. No what? Nevermind. Point is, this is Jon. Jonah Magnus, er, Elias. They’re the same person-”

“Uh-huh.”

Tim blows on the dice. For good luck. 

“-uh, Elias. Just Elias. For simplicity’s sake. He’s the real enemy here, Tim. He’s the one that made Jon like this.”

“Like a spooky monster,” Tim flatly says, looking down at the seven he rolled. 

The Archivist, for the first time today, bristles and grabs the dice with a scowl. “I am not spooky, Tim.”

“Says the spooky eye monster that caused the end of the world,” Tim remarks. He watches as the Archivist rolls an even six. 

“You are kinda spooky, dear,” Martin admits. The Archivist turns to glare at him behind its blindfold. Martin just grins stupidly because they’re both stupid and in love despite everything and Tim fucking  _ hates  _ them (really.) 

“You’re both disgusting,” Tim says. He takes the dice and hesitates before he rolls. Could go either way, and he’s down two already. And he doesn’t want to- well, he does. He does. But he also doesn’t want the Archivist to  _ compel _ him, because that tickles and Tim doesn’t have the emotional stamina right now to deal with tickling. “You deserve each other.”

He rolls, and the Archivist hums approvingly. “Thank you, Tim. I just wish I got my head out of my ass earlier.”

Tim scowls and shoves the dice (another  _ fucking three!!! _ ) towards it. “Yeah, whatever.”

He’s sure it and Martin have a fucking adorable thing going on. Perfect. Before it ended the world, the Archivist probably got loads of hugs and kisses and bullshit. They probably had a cat. Or something. Probably didn’t bother sending flowers to Tim’s grave or anything on the anniversary, mostly because Tim never got an official grave and J- the Archivist was too busy trying to do weird spooky bullshit back in London. And Martin didn’t because he was apparently too busy sucking Forsaken’s dick and wallowing in his own self-pity. 

The Archivist’s mouth twitches, and its face almost...melts. “Tim… I was in a coma. For your funeral. And for a while afterwards.”

It rolls. It rolls a three. It properly frowns. “I’m sorry. For everything. You deserved better.”

Tim blinks back what would be tears if he still had tear ducts or a functioning lacrimal system. He sniffs and takes the dice and stares down at them. “Yeah. I did. So did you, Martin. And Sasha. And everyone. And- and Jon.”

“You could come with us?” Martin offers, voice so quiet it can barely be heard above the screams from the far side of the village. Filth must’ve finally reached it, then. “To London. We’re going to fix this.”

“Are you?” Tim asks. He meets Martin’s eyes, and they’re the wrong color. Not the warm brown they should be. The same icy blue as that dead Lukas’. “I don’t think killing Elias will fix anything. You couldn’t do it, anyway.”

He pointedly doesn’t look at the Archivist. The Archivist doesn’t say a thing. 

“Hence why you need to come,” Martin continues. He’s still holding the Archivist’s hand. It’s precious. It shouldn’t be. “Avatar of the End, you can kill just about anything, can’t you? ‘Sides. You’re our friend.”

Tim clenches the dice. He could stop now. There aren’t any rules against it, stopping in the middle of a game. The Archivist and Martin are going to die, anyway, and there isn’t anything Tim could do to stop it other than this game. And they should die, anyway. Time. Everyone goes in the End. 

And shoving a tape recorder up Elias Bouchard’s ass until his fist comes out of that filthy, lying, bougie mouth would feel  _ so, so good. _

One more roll, that’s all they have. The Archivist could die in ten seconds. Or Tim could finally,  _ finally  _ disappear like he’s wanted to for coming on at least an eternity now (and Danny won’t be waiting for him, because there’s nothing after this, Tim knows this, no Danny or Sasha or Jon.) 

“Hey, Jon?” Tim asks, voice shaking just a bit. Barely at all. Ignore the obvious, Martin, it’s what you’re good at. “I’m not sorry about ducking out during the Unknowing. Saved the world, didn’t it?”

The Archivist and Martin look at each other briefly. 

“Yeah,” says the Archivist. “You did.”

“It was nice seeing you again,” Martin weakly says. “If Jon wins, do think about coming with us. It’ll be like old times?”

Tim snorts and shakes his head and offers what he hopes looks like a genuine smile. “Yeah, sure. Nice seeing you, I guess. Thanks for ending the world, both of you.”

Tim rolls. 

Snake eyes. 

**Author's Note:**

> So, funny story, I was going through the wiki and found something neat in the bit about the End! So Tim works for the End now! Whoops!
> 
> My podcast tumblr is [here!!!](https://petermeetpeter.tumblr.com/)
> 
> also i haven't written tim before and also i haven't heard anything about/from him since the last time i listened through in uhhh september? early october? so sorry if he's. ooc. and an asshole.


End file.
